Apple's Siri Shuns 35 Million Americans--Are You One?

The new voice-recognition feature in Apple's iPhone 4S, known as Siri, carries out simple tasks for you when you speak to it, but only if you’re an English speaker in the United States.

Siri can handle simple tasks, like composing, sending, and reading text messages, and checking the weather report, in five languages: U.S. English, U.K. English, Australian English, French (France), and German. But if you want to use Siri to its full potential, you have to speak American English and you need to physically be in the U.S. Ask Siri to find a local business (ATM? car-towing service?) or get directions for you in any other language, and you’ll be out of luck. Even if you’re in the U.S., if the language option is set to U.K. English, Siri will tell you, sorry, but no.

Siri No Habla EspañolWhen I first saw the language options for Siri, I was shocked to not find Spanish. The software is still technically in beta, and Apple has said that it will add support for more languages in 2012, but to come out of the gate with a mass-market speech tool for the United States that disregards 12 percent of the target market is kind of ridiculous.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau (2008), 35 million U.S. residents age 5 and older spoke Spanish at home. That’s 12 percent of U.S. residents. And while more than half of this population also reported knowing English “very well,” people almost always prefer their native tongue, especially when they need to get work done or troubleshoot technology. For example, online shoppers are six times more likely to complete a purchase if the payment instructions are available in their native tongue—even if they read English perfectly well.

Business DecisionsWhen Apple planned its most recent press conference to announce the iPhone 4S, I’m guessing that the company had to look at the cards it was holding and figure out how to play the strongest hand. Hype and rumors about an iPhone 5 were rampant, and the decision-makers clearly knew that revealing anything less would result in some disappointment, regardless of the fact that the iPhone 4S does sport some big enhancements over the iPhone 4. Apple had a few other cards to play, and one of them was Siri, a technology that the company acquired in 2010.

In my personal opinion, I don’t think Siri is ready for prime time. At least Apple acknowledges that fact by calling Siri a beta product, one that admittedly needs to develop more. I always joke that “open beta” is code for “you can’t criticize it yet.” I worry that too many companies are releasing “betas,” and shirking responsibility for whether the product is any good, or complete, or gets something very very wrong. While I think most early adopters like to be able to test unfinished products, there is some danger in making a beta open (available to all) rather than closed (available only to those who sign up and are granted access).

When it came time to make that business decision to include Siri in the October Apple event (after all, it could have held back Siri and included it in later upgrade to iOS, or launched it as a separate app a few months down the line), I think many Apple executives knew that Siri wasn’t ready, and that the lack of Spanish is a big reason why. But they needed to play another card, and so Siri was included... “in beta.”

Quien Va a Hablar Español?In the case of Siri, not including Spanish upon releasing the technology in the U.S. publicly was a huge mistake for Apple. Not including the Spanish-speaking community in a major consumer product in the U.S., but including other language communities, comes with a lot of other social baggage. Regardless, it's a huge missed business opportunity.

Twelve percent of the U.S. may rightfully turn its attention to Android phones, the iPhone’s strongest competitor, and the platform best positioned to attract Latino-Americans and other Spanish speakers if it introduces a competing product that works as well as Siri. (Some have pointed to Speaktoit, but that product is also in beta and is fairly buggy and not as comprehensive as Siri). But Android, backed by Google’s impressive work to date with language support and translation, has an open window to do something great for 35 million Americans.

Jill Duffy is a contributing editor, specializing in productivity apps and software, as well as technologies for health and fitness. She writes the weekly Get Organized column, with tips on how to lead a better digital life. Her first book, Get Organized: How to Clean Up Your Messy Digital Life is available for Kindle, iPad, and other digital formats. She is also the creator and author of ProductivityReport.org.
Before joining PCMag.com, she was senior editor at the Association for Computing Machinery, a non-profit membership organization for...
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